Two Deli Brands Involved in Scandal over Kashrut

Sinai Kosher and Best Kosher meats are being pulled off delis’ and butchers’ shelves as retailers coast to coast comply with a rabbinical statement recommending against the use of those products.

When widely respected Orthodox rabbis Gedalia Dov Schwartz of Chicago, Sholom Rivkin of St. Louis and Nota Greenblatt of Memphis recently visited slaughterhouses that supply Sinai and Best with their meat, they found conditions there that render the brands’ products unacceptable, sources said.

In a statement made public this week, the three rabbis said “that serious irregularities in procedures exist in certain slaughterhouses” that supply Sinai and Best and, as a result, the rabbis “no longer recommend” the meats sold under those brand names.

They did not come right out and call non-kosher the companies’ hot dogs, sausages, corned beef, brisket, veal, lamb and other deli meats items, for fear that a lawsuit might be brought by the Bessin Corp., which produces the Sinai and Best brands, explained a rabbi involved in the situation.

But their statement has virtually the same effect.

Schwartz said he hopes the company rectifies the problems with their kashrut soon.

Bessin’s vice president of sales, Michael Hahn, said, “We hope to resolve this issue after a very short period, so I don’t believe it will have a significant impact on sales. We have an optimistic future,” he said.

Bessin is owned by Sara Lee Corp., which bought the company earlier this year.

Many observers say it is impossible for the rabbis’ statement not to have a dramatic, longterm impact.

In the kosher world, “your credibility is your worth,” said Alan Abbey, publisher of the Kosher Business newsletter, which recently suspended publication.

‘A SIGNIFICANT BLOW’

“If you lose that good name, you’re hurting. It’s a significant blow. At Sara Lee, heads are probably spinning,” he said.

The rabbis made their determination after being involved in “two investigative situations,” according to Schwartz, who heads the religious court, or beit din, of the Rabbinical Council of America, the New York-based association of Orthodox rabbis.

He would not provide any details of what they found or how long the investigations lasted.

The rabbis’ recommendation has so far affected retailers in the Chicago, Los Angeles, Memphis, St. Louis and Dallas areas.

In New York, where the kosher population is a diverse lot, each community makes its own decisions regarding kosher products and it is difficult to ascertain how many stores were adhering to the rabbis’ ruling.

According to Rabbi Mayer Bendet, a spokesman for OK Laboratories, a Brooklyn-based kashrut supervising agency, the rabbis visited the slaughterhouses and came to the conclusion that “you can’t touch that stuff.

“Did we suspect it? Yes, we did. We had information from people who worked there going a year back that things were really bad,” he said.

Rabbi John Shawl, a kashrut administrator in Dallas, said that “some terrible things were going on that would not be comfortable for any person who wants to keep kosher,” but would not be more specific.

Another source, who asked not to be named, said the rabbis found that the men slaughtering the animals were not Sabbath-observant. According to Jewish law, the meat is not kosher if slaughtered by men who are not shomer Shabbat.

This source also said the rabbis found that the knives used for killing the steer were not being checked as often as is required according to halachah.

The three rabbis who supervise the kashrut of Sinai and Best products — Yeshua Hershel Kaufman, Yosef Arieh Leff and Michael Small — put out their own statement on June 6, defending their supervision.

“All of the company’s meat sources are of the highest caliber of kashrut as required by Torah Law. The total production of Sinai Kosher and Best Kosher Sausage Companies are under the constant supervision of God-fearing and knowledgeable mashgichim,” they said, using the Hebrew word for supervisors.

“We wish to reassure the Jewish community that nothing has changed in any aspect of production of Sinai Kosher and Best Kosher products. Use of these products conforms to the highest standards of kashrut as prescribed by the Code of Jewish Law (Shulchan Aruch),” the statement said.

THE PRODUCTS ‘WILL BE MISSED’

But Debbie Linksman, owner of Kosher Link, Dallas’ only kosher butcher, is taking the advice of her rabbi, and has pulled all Sinai and Best products from her shelves.

Sixty percent of the meat she sold came from those companies, and “they will be missed. They were very popular products, because most of the kosher homes here do not use Hebrew National. It filled in a space” between Hebrew National and glatt meat, she said.

Sinai and Best meats were considered more reliable, in terms of kashrut, than Hebrew National, said sources, though neither is acceptable to the stringently Orthodox, who eat only glatt kosher meat.

Glatt means smooth, and refers to an extra check of the lungs of the slaughtered animal, to make sure that the organ is smooth, as it must be in order to be kosher.

But glatt consumers represent a small percentage of the $300-$400 million kosher meat market, Kosher Business’ Abbey said.

Bessin’s Hahn said that Best and Sinai meats do about $100 million in business a year.

Sinai, Best and Hebrew National products are popular with Conservative Jews who keep kosher homes, and more popular with Orthodox Jews outside of major metropolitan areas, where glatt kosher meat is not as readily available, said observers of the kosher food scene.

Linksman, who said she is stuck with at least $3,000 worth of Best and Sinai inventory, added that “it will take a long time to restore confidence” in the brands.

“It will take a whole new group of supervising rabbis to go back in there and do what they need to do and to convince the public that it is OK. And it will take more than a week to do that.”